Coursera-Crypto1 Week1

Week 1 - Problem Set

Question 1

Data compression is often used in data storage and transmission. Suppose you want to use data compression in conjunction with encryption. Does it make more sense to:

The order does not matter -- neither one will compress the data.

The order does not matter -- either one is fine.

Encrypt then compress.

Compress then encrypt.

Ciphertexts tend to look like random strings and therefore the only opportunity for compression is prior to encryption.

Question 2

Let G:{0,1}s→{0,1}n be a secure PRG. Which of the following is a secure PRG (there is more than one correct answer):

G′(k1,k2)=G(k1)∥∥G(k2)     (here ∥∥ denotes concatenation)

a distinguisher for G′ gives a distinguisher for G.

G′(k)=G(0)

A distinguisher will output not random whenever its input is equal to G(0).

G′(k)=reverse(G(k))     where reverse(x) reverses the string x so that the first bit of x is the last bit of reverse(x), the second bit of x is the second to last bit of reverse(x), and so on.

a distinguisher for G′ gives a distinguisher for G.

G′(k)=G(k)∥∥0     (here ∥∥ denotes concatenation)

A distinguisher will output not random whenever the last bit of its input is 0.

G′(k)=G(k)∥∥G(k)     (here ∥∥ denotes concatenation)

A distinguisher will output not random whenever the first n bits are equal to the last n bits.

G′(k)=G(k)[0,…,n?2]     (i.e., G′(k) drops the last bit of G(k))

a distinguisher for G′ gives a distinguisher for G.

Question 3

Let G:K→{0,1}n be a secure PRG. Define G′(k1,k2)=G(k1)?G(k2) where ? is the bit-wise AND function. Consider the following statistical test A on {0,1}n: 
A(x) outputs LSB(x), the least significant bit of x. 
What is AdvPRG[A,G′] ?    You may assume that LSB(